"You look more handsome when you aren't frowning."
Ivan's head jerked back, eyes widening a little when none other than Emma Jansen, personification of the Kingdom of Belgium, slid into the chair facing his own. He swiftly smoothed his expression out into something friendlier, slinging one leg over the other as he made himself more comfortable in his own seat. He took in her appearance as she took off her coat and put down her purse. She was wearing an elegant black dress, making him suspect she had come here straight from a party of sorts. He wanted to tell her that she didn't have to join him simply because they were obliged to be polite due to their status, but then again, this was her country. No matter her intentions, Ivan had no say in her actions as long as they were here.
The woman (when had she grown so tall? He could still remember her as the little girl she once was, Netherlands' baby sister) ordered a coffee for herself—scratch that, make it a beer, they got the best beers in Belgium did you know? Yes, Ivan knew. Those were the first words to leave his mouth that evening, easily slipping back into the French tongue he had mastered so long ago.
"Was it your intention to make me blush?" Ivan then asked, curiosity piqued. "I never knew you thought of me as handsome." He smiled fondly, eyes twinkling, cheeks and nose already slightly rosy from the liquor he'd indulged in throughout the evening.
Emma chuckled, the high tones tickling at his ears. "Any girl with eyes in their head can see you are, Ivan." Any man too. But that needn't be said; she wasn't here to question the Russian about his past relationships or his country's politics when it came to these matters. She was here…as a friend. Because she wanted to be here.
"You really do want to make me blush," Ivan scolded her playfully, Emma neither denying nor affirming the accusation. Then he grew slightly more serious. "But if this is about today's meeting…"
Emma shook her head furiously, raising a hand to put a stop to his words. "No, I don't want to hear anything more about today's meeting. It's Friday night, let's not let our work intrude into our personal time." They already got so little of it.
Ivan leant forward, elbows resting on his knees, fingers laced together to support his chin. "Then did you simply come to join me for a drink because you have lost a bet? Or have you been dared to post a picture online of me blushing?"
She shook her head again, then made a gesture of zipping her mouth shut. "My lips are sealed." He wouldn't get the truth out of her by simply asking.
"Then…" He raised a pale eyebrow.
Emma bent over, smiling mischievously. "Then you are stuck with me for the night, Braginsky."
~o~
Ivan couldn't remember how they had gotten here. He vaguely recalled staying there in that bar for what felt like hours, talking and laughing, feeling huge amounts of stress slip off his shoulders with each drink that passed their table. Anyone who had never seen Emma drink would be unable to believe the amount of alcohol that petite body of hers could hold.
But now, for whatever reason, he found himself outside, standing before an unfamiliar house, Emma leaning against a wall next to him. She was rummaging through her purse, as if trying to take something from it, but Ivan only had eyes for those long legs in dark nylon, the coat slipping off a broad shoulder. Why were they here again? Wherever this was. Had Emma invited him to…?
The booze drowned out any nerves he could have felt, morphing it into a sort of lazy acceptance of the situation. He put his lips to a patch of uncovered skin, drawing a gasp and giggle from the girl.
"Ivan, that's not how you help me find my keys!" Her tone was berating, like scolding a naughty child, but her eyes were sparkling. She finally managed to grab hold of her house key, scraped it along the lock several times before a larger hand took hold of hers, guiding the key into the hole.
"Ah, you still need to be seduced?" Ivan giggled, alcoholic bravado making him take the situation not as seriously as his sober self would have. It wasn't that he didn't think Emma to be an attractive woman, quite on the contrary. But that didn't mean he was actively thinking about having sex with every attractive person he met, day in day out! What if Emma took offence to his actions, and threw him out of her house—no, her country?
Luckily for him, she played along. The door opening behind her, she playfully grabbed Ivan's tie and wound it round her hand, coaxing him further into the house. He stumbled behind her, intrigued, the door falling shut behind him as soon as they had entered.
~o~
Even later still, and Ivan felt both extraordinarily drunk and at the same time much soberer. It was currently 4 AM, and Emma was cooking some kind of oven dish in her small kitchen. Ivan couldn't understand how one could still cook, being as plastered as they were, but then he remembered all the times he had gotten a small craving for something light, one of those long nights. Those nights usually resulted in a hangover that could have killed regular human beings, and a kitchen that desperately needed renovation, but he doubted Emma would go to the same extremes.
Emma became aware of his staring, sending a mirthful smile over her shoulder. "Say, do you still wrestle?" The question came seemingly out of nowhere, but Ivan knew what she meant. For…people like them, it sometimes became hard to actually feel alive—living was something of surreal existentiality, an enigma in itself. When their kind got to that inevitable down, they sought out ways to ground themselves, push their bodies to extremes, and in that way get in touch with their human side. It helped, even if it wasn't all that healthy for the mortal form they took on.
Ivan's eyes locked with hers as a memory resurfaced. The year was 1945. Half a decade of war and internal struggles and loss had tired them all, some more than others. Ivan remembered a hazy night of bodies clashing and muscles being worked to torturous lengths, the immortal letting himself all but be pummeled to death. He remembered seeing a woman from the corners of his eyes, staring intently at their match—no, at him and him alone, as if she recognized him (impossible, humans weren't to know).
He recalled her soft green eyes roving his ravished body, pale and bloody and bruised, chest heaving and sweat glistening on the naked skin of his torso. He had lifted his head, completely forgetting that he was in a fight, intently looking back at her—waiting for those eyes to slowly wander up, stop, like a key fitting into a tight lock, some kind of understanding written in that hungry gaze; a kinship, but also…
A blow to the side of his head had been enough to knock him out. He, at that moment the glorious Soviet Union, Soyuz Sovetskikh Sotsialisticheskikh Respublik, downed by a mere human. Ivan remembered waking up in her hotel room, the woman wordlessly tending to his wounds. He had never asked why, disregarded the painkillers she gave him, and left before the sun rising.
She had never mentioned that day before. Why start now?
"Depends," Ivan murmured, incessant staring falling into place with the plate of spaghetti appearing before him.
"Eat," she ordered, like a mother hen fussing over her clutch, only a mother wouldn't look at her children with such intent as she did to him. "And what does it depend on, comrade?"
Ah, he would never be rid of that teasing jab, no matter where he went. One got used to it. Still, he smiled as he twirled some pasta onto his fork, albeit with little more difficulty now that his hand-eye coordination was disrupted by the amount of alcohol in his blood. "It depends entirely on whether or not you still hold drinking contests."
Her movements slowed, the cutlery she was drying off being put down beside her, neatly, fork next to knife next to spoon. She turned around, leaning against the counter, chest puffed out. "Maybe I do. Maybe I don't."
"Only one way to find out?" he asked, almost innocently, batting his eyes up at her. Drunk or not, there was always room for more of the divine spirits, and he knew Emma shared in that sentiment.
For a moment, the only sound to be heard was the clinking of fork against stone plate and the rhythmic ticking of long nails to honed granite. Then she sighed, almost in exasperation, and went straight for the cabinet that kept her greatest treasures. Ivan's smile grew wider and more content, like a cat's, when several familiar bottles were taken out. Humming appreciatively as he finished his meal, he watched closely how Emma selected a bottle and conjured up two shot glasses. In a flash she was before him, sitting down with a gaze of determination endearing her vibrant features.
"I have a proposal," the woman declared, pouring both of them a glass as Ivan pushed his plate out of harm's way; they weren't at Herakles' house, after all. "A question…" One glass was pushed towards him, and Ivan caught it with the expertise of someone who had been drinking and dealing with all its consequences for as long as he could remember. "An answer…" Cap was screwed back onto the bottle. "If you refuse to answer, you take a shot. Simple as that."
Ivan practically purred, leaning back in his chair, one block of massive hulk with crossed arms and hooded amethysts. "No political questions."
"Of course," she quickly amended, "we'll keep it at a personal level."
Personal. It seemed like quite a while ago since he had done something for himself, Ivan Braginsky, and not himself, the Russian Federation. Life got quite busy when you were immortal.
"Ladies first," he said with a nod of the head, Emma narrowing her eyes in response.
"Who was your first?"
"My first what?"
"You know what, Ivan."
His eyes narrowed as well, watching that cutely victorious gleam in her bright eyes. Ah, so that was the game Emma wanted to play. But she shouldn't forget that he wasn't as much of a prude as he used to be, seeming already so long ago.
Leaning forward, his gaze became calculating as he wove his fingers together. "Humans do not count, da? We are talking about first time with one of us."
"Aha, so your first was a human!" Emma proclaimed, making Ivan grumble a bit. Nevertheless, he had vowed to win, and thus was obligated to answer.
Turning his head away, unable to stop the faintest of pinks from colouring his marble cheeks, he mumbled a quick "Frantsiya", cringing when the expected scream of jubilation followed.
"Ha! I knew it I knew it I knew it—"
He lurched forward, placing a hand over her mouth. "I believe it is my turn?" he asked, sugary sweet, finding amusement in the way her eyes widened, breath lost for just a sliver of a moment as he stroked his thumb along a plush lip. Then she lightly swatted at the hand and sat back down, effects of the alcohol finally starting to show in her youthful excitement.
Ivan immediately went for a counter-attack. "Out of all your marriages, which one did you enjoy the most?"
"France as well," she immediately replied, almost hoping for a reaction (but what kind? Betrayal, sadness, perhaps even jealousy? Of whom?), "That was an easy one, Ivan. You know how France has treats his spouses, both male and female."
Ivan shrugged. "Eh, true. But you could have had a secret love affair no one knew about."
"Ah-ah! My turn!"
They both laughed, unconsciously leaning in closer and closer.
"Which one do you prefer: men or women?"
After a long pause, "I find myself privy to men." Maybe it was the booze loosening his tongue, or maybe he felt somehow safe in Emma's house, the intimacy which they had created through a temporary mutual trust. The first drink had yet to be downed, but it almost seemed as if they were too busy thinking about each other to mind the waiting glasses.
"Do you have a type?"
"Oh yes, big and handsome and with a good sense of humour." (His cheeks coloured deeper.) "Ever wore a dress or skirt?"
"My beloved empress used to make me." Wasting not even a second, he followed up in a low voice, "How long has it been since you kissed another nation?"
Her breath stopped, only now becoming aware of their closeness. She could see every dent and curve and line in Ivan's smooth features, the fine stubble hiding to the pale contrast of his skin, well-defined brow following down to his nose as it slid alongside hers, breath reeking of the liquor they'd both ingested.
"I'm going to pass on that one," she whispered hoarsely, eyes fluttering shut as he crossed the remaining distance. The night had been a long one, nevertheless, it seemed far from over.